


this world is not for you

by Perks



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Identity Issues, M/M, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-06
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:47:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23516446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Perks/pseuds/Perks
Summary: The Asset is on the run from Hydra and slowly regaining his memories. He doesn't know why, but he can't shake the feeling that he knows Steve Rogers. (Post-TWS)
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this fic takes place after the events of _the winter soldier_ and ignores the beginning of _civil war_ because steve and bucky deserved a better reunion than that. the title comes from the song “reptilia” by the strokes.

“So dear I love him that with him all deaths

I could endure, without him live no life.”

-John Milton, _Paradise Lost_

The memories started out by coming back in flashes. At first, they were incomprehensible to the Asset: knowing the location of someone else’s spare key under a rock on their front porch; his hand affectionately gripping a bony shoulder; the feeling of laughing until his sides were aching. These left the Asset more confused than anything, and he knew from experience that confusion was bad and warranted punishment, usually resulting in a wipe. His mind knew he was far away from Hydra, on the run in a safehouse, but his body remembered what it was to be punished. He quickly put the flashes out of his mind.

But gradually, other memories started to come back, and these were more insistent on being remembered and more difficult to get rid of: clutching a short, skinny body slick with sweat and trembling with fever to his own in a tiny bed that barely held one person; sunlight glinting off a familiar blond head as the quiet sound of a single pencil scratching filled the small room; the overwhelming sounds of Brooklyn, loud, bustling, and alive, and how anywhere else had seemed too quiet in comparison.

The Asset’s body was not a priority. Hydra had taught him this: it was simply a vessel. So he stole food when he needed to, slept as little as possible, and changed locations without a second thought. He wasn’t leaving anything behind that mattered, after all. What mattered now, his mission, was to learn who he was, or at least who he had been before the torture had stripped any sense of selfhood away. And who the man on the bridge was—the first target the Asset had saved, the first person he had felt _compelled_ to save—that mattered, too.

But the longer the Asset was on the run, the quicker the _other_ memories started to return—the bad ones. Bleeding out into the snow until he left a red trail behind him; the smug smirk on Alexander Pierce’s face, knowing his secrets were safe as he watched the Asset undergo yet another wipe; the bitter taste of iron in the Asset’s mouth as he obediently clenched his teeth around the mouth guard and everything in his vision turned white with pain. Memory was not selective: he had known this before, but that was before. Now he learned it again.

At moments like these, ~~~~the Asset wished for his better memories, most of which involved the man on the bridge. Steve Rogers, Captain America—whatever the man on the bridge was called, the Asset knew that he knew him. What he didn’t know was why, and this was something that needed to be remedied. So the Asset did the only thing he could.

He ran.

* * *

The Smithsonian Institution, the Asset found, had a wealth of information for anyone curious about the man they referred to as Captain America. The bulk of the exhibit featured photos, text, videos, and even authentic period costumes surrounding the life and achievements of the heroic Captain during the war. They called the man the Asset had fought on the bridge a symbol to the nation and a hero to the world. The group known as the Howling Commandos was honored there as well—Dum Dum Dugan, Gabe Jones, James Montgomery Falsworth, Jacques Dernier, Jim Morita, and Bucky Barnes. The men’s names seemed familiar to the Asset, but he couldn’t explain why. The exhibit boasted of how the Commandos had “defeated the rogue Nazi science division known as Hydra,” but the Asset was part of Hydra. He was what Pierce had called their secret weapon. The Asset knew Hydra as thoroughly as he knew all of the different ways there were to end a target’s life, and it was far from dead; his body alone was proof.

His ears picked up the sound of a slight groan of metal, and the Asset realized his left hand had unconsciously curled into a tight fist at this thought. Surprised, he uncurled his metal fingers and shoved his hand into a pocket. Suddenly, he heard Zola’s words in his mind, proclaiming him the new fist of Hydra, and he was shocked to feel anger grip him. He was angry at Zola, Pierce, everyone who had hurt him, made him forget, or forced him to kill for them. Squeezing his eyes shut, the Asset made himself slow down his breathing and focus on his mission. He was here to gather information so that he could regain his memories. That was all.

Eventually, though, the Asset arrived at a section of the exhibit that made his breath stop in his throat. He stared for a long moment at the large memorial panel photo of a man who looked a lot like him, albeit more clean-shaven and less hardened, but the resemblance was unmistakable. _Bucky_. That was what the man on the bridge had called the Asset: this man’s name. It seemed like they had meant something to each other; the memorial had called them _inseparable on both schoolyard and battlefield_ and _best friends since childhood_. The Asset didn’t remember being the soldier they called James Barnes, but he thought he might eventually be able to remember being Bucky, the man Steve Rogers had known, the person the man on the bridge had somehow seen in him. He spent hours pacing through the museum exhibit, head lowered under his faded baseball cap and eyes scanning the paragraphs of text hungrily, hoping to spark a memory, a feeling, anything.

The memorial panel told the Asset that Barnes was the only Howling Commando to have given his life in service of his country, but the Asset thought again of the terror he had felt in his memory of falling from the train in the snow to what he thought was his death.

Another memory accosted the Asset’s mind—a longer one this time. Despite his attempts to prevent it from overwhelming him, he was powerless in the moment; it was like trying to hold back a wave.

 _“See? Told you! They’re all idiots,” crows Bucky. It is 1943 in London, in a bar called the Whip & Fiddle. Bucky is sitting with Steve, this newer, taller_ _Steve, Captain America, they’re calling him now, and he is so goddamn happy to be alive after Zola and Red Skull and everything that happened in Austria that he’s practically glowing and barely needs to sip the bourbon in his hand to feel tipsy. Of course it helps his mood, too, that Steve is beside him, safe and happy and looking pleased as punch to be away from the war for a while. He’s glad for it, even if Steve is bigger and stronger and just overall different now, more confident, and more able to hold his own in a fistfight than just a few months ago when he was short and scrawny and picked a fight with every bully he came across. It doesn’t escape Bucky’s attention that Steve is actively trying to recruit soldiers for his new team—The Howlers?—whatever they’re called. The thing is, he’s just so grateful to be here, in this particular moment and back with Steve, together where they both belong, that he can’t be bothered with details right about now._

_“How about you? You ready to follow Captain America into the jaws of death?” Steve asks, jolting Bucky away from his thoughts and back to reality with more than a hint of sarcasm in his voice._

_Bucky shakes his head. He responds, tone light, “Hell no.” He doesn’t meet Steve’s eyes as he starts, “That little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb not to run away from a fight…” He stops speaking for a moment, looking Steve full in the face. “I’m following him.”_

_Their gazes are still fixed on each other; all of a sudden, the moment is more serious than Bucky intended, but Steve doesn’t break eye contact until someone Bucky hardly notices, a bar employee, places a drink in front of him. Bucky takes a gulp of his whiskey to wet his newly dry mouth, feeling like he has just given something secret away, and changes the subject: “But you’re keeping the outfit, right?”_

_Steve turns back to face Bucky and smiles, one corner of his mouth quirking up. It’s like sunshine, that smile, Bucky thinks, so bright and warm you could just soak in it. “You know what?” Steve glances over at a cheesy tour poster of Steve in his stage suit, advertising CAPTAIN AMERICA ON TOUR, but modified to now read, TOUR CANCELLED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. “It’s kinda growin’ on me.”_

The memory ended as abruptly as it had begun, and the Asset was dazed at the sudden sense of loss he felt for a life he didn’t recognize. Tightness pressed itself into his chest and his breath came out sounding ragged to his own ears. _That man on the bridge—Steve Rogers—I knew him._ His brows knit together in confusion at the thought, but there it was: the truth, plain and simple. _I knew him._ He strained to recall more, but his mind refused. He hated it, this loss of control he had over his own brain. He couldn’t make himself remember his past on his own, but that was what research was for, and as Hydra had told him, the Asset had a talent for learning things he wasn’t supposed to know.


	2. Chapter 2

It was easier than the Asset expected to find out information about Captain America’s past. The Asset knew him, this was true, or at least some past version of him did, but so did the whole world, and the Internet made it easy for anyone to find out anything they wanted to know, whether it was about Captain Rogers or not. This included the address of the run-down two-bedroom a young Steve Rogers used to live in with his mother Sarah, back before the super soldier serum and the war and everything else that had happened in the years that seemed a lifetime since 1936. The Asset made quick time, as he always did, as he had been trained to do, and soon he was standing in Brooklyn face-to-face with what could barely be called a house. It was easier still to grip the smallest of the many knives the Asset kept on his person and pick open the lock, and soon he had slipped inside. 

The house was clearly abandoned and as devoid of people as it had been for decades, but strangely, the Asset felt a sense of recognition, of _home_ , as soon as he stepped over the threshold. Thick layers of dust, undisturbed for years, swirled up to meet his silent steps as his feet carried him instinctually to a small bedroom. He couldn’t explain it if he tried, but somehow his body knew before his mind did that it was Steve’s room. Streaks of sunlight trickled in through the glass windows, warming the Asset’s face. He blinked, and another memory hit him.

_“I thought I already told ya to quit movin’, you jerk,” complains Steve, his tone stern, but then he laughs. It’s golden hour, sunlight pouring into the tiny room, and the long-suffering Steve is working on yet another portrait of Bucky._

_Bucky grins, shakes himself all over like a wet dog just to piss Steve off, and sighs dramatically before settling into his earlier sitting position. “All right, all right, Rogers. As long as you promise to make me look good.” The banter is familiar between them, easy as breathing; he would never admit it, but he loves these moments._

_“It’d take a miracle for that to happen, ya ugly mug,” Steve huffs good-naturedly. Bucky can barely see his friend’s blond head and short, boney frame from behind his sketchpad as the sound of charcoal scratching furiously on paper resumes._

_“How’re the new pencils?” Bucky asks softly, leaning his head back so it rests on the window. He closes his eyes. “Like ‘em?”_

_“Shoulda saved the money, you ass,” mumbles Steve, then adds, quietly: “But they’re perfect. Thanks, Buck.”_

_“Anytime,” Bucky promises, the smile spreading itself across his face naturally, as if it’s been there forever, the way it always is when he’s around Steve. Bucky doesn’t say it, but it’s understood, what he means—anything for Steve._

_The silence is comfortable between them. The moment stretches out into the evening, no end in sight, and the contentment is palpable.  
_

Before the Asset knew it, the memory was over and he was back in the present, the warm sensation he had felt fading with each second that passed. It took him a minute to realize that his eyes were stinging with tears, and he quickly wiped them away with the swipe of his right hand. All the damn hardship in his life but Bucky’d never been a crier and he wasn’t about to start now—crying meant showing weakness and weakness meant punishment from his handlers, the Asset knew this—

His head swam with all of the selves he had been and was no longer. It overcame him, this weight, he felt it down to his bones: all of the lives he wasn’t living. The rush of thoughts, flashes, memories, was so overwhelming all of a sudden that he could hardly think. He crouched in the dust to steady himself, breathing hard until his heartbeat slowed and one thought pushed through the mess of everything else in his mind, strengthening his resolve. _Steve_ , he thought _. I’m on my way. I’m coming back to you._


	3. Chapter 3

It was a strange and new experience, the Asset thought, to be looking for someone who actually wanted to be found. It was another strange and new experience for him to knock on said someone’s front door, but the Asset tried not to think about that fact. It took only hours for the Asset to find Steve Rogers’ current address, and he had seen demolished buildings with better security measures. But now he was here, inexplicably nervous as he stood on Captain America’s porch in the dead of night, gripping a small, sharp knife in his metal fist for protection.

He had almost considered leaving when he heard footsteps and the door finally swung open to reveal the man on the bridge. He looked like he couldn’t believe his eyes. “Holy shit. Bucky? Is that you?”

The Asset swallowed. “No.” He paused, voice gravelly with unuse. It had been months since he had spoken to another person. He corrected himself. “Yes.”

He didn’t know what to say to this man, couldn’t believe he had made himself vulnerable in this way. He had the fleeting thought that Hydra would have—and had—killed many people for a chance like this, a chance to get the Winter Soldier back.

The Asset tightened his hold on his dagger, then slipped it into his boot and reminded himself that this was Steve, and Steve wouldn’t hurt him. He chided himself: Hadn’t he learned that by now, time and time again? Hadn’t Steve proved it to him many times over?

“Can I come in?” The words cracked as they left his lips.

If the Asset thought _he_ had been nervous, well, Steve Rogers looked like he had seen someone die and come back to life right in front of him. It was like he was afraid to move in case the Asset disappeared again, but he got ahold of himself fairly quickly. “Yes, of course, sorry, come in, please sit,” he stammered, moving aside and ushering the Asset into his living room.

“How did you find me?” Steve asked as the two of them sat on his couch. His apartment now was sleek and modern, with some old-fashioned things in it to remind him of home: there was a record player beside the couch, and some black-and-white photos of Brooklyn in the ‘40s and a few of Steve’s own sketches lined the walls.

The Asset shrugged. "Wasn’t hard."

Steve watched him, an expectant look in his eyes. Clearly he was dying to ask questions but didn’t want to overwhelm the highly trained assassin sitting before him. The Asset wet his lips and started to speak, and once he had begun, it was like a dam had burst—he couldn’t stop.

“I was on the run from Hydra and I didn’t plan on coming back, but then I started to… remember things. From Bucky’s—I mean, my past. I had these memories, and they didn’t make sense. I went to your exhibit at the Smithsonian, and I read about you, me, the Howling Commandos, the war… I remembered London—that bar—your ridiculous costume.” He let out a dry chuckle. “Then I went to Brooklyn. To our tiny old apartment. All those years, we were barely scraping by, just us against the world, but I don’t think I’ve ever been happier, before or since. You remember?” He didn’t wait for a reply but continued in a rush. “I know I’ve been gone for a while. I’m not the person I was, and I don’t know if I’m Bucky anymore or if I can be the man you think I am, but—”

He stopped, voice thick with an emotion he couldn’t name. Then he took a deep breath and continued, barely audible, but knowing Steve’s improved super soldier hearing would pick up the sound. “If you don’t want me to be here, I’ll go. But I… I hope it’s okay that I came back.” He fiddled with his hands, not knowing what to do with his limbs. His mind raced, thinking of what Bucky would say, what Steve wanted to hear, but the words somehow felt right as he spoke them: “I figure the universe has tried to keep us apart so many times and it hasn’t worked—I didn’t want to give it another chance.”

Bucky couldn’t meet Steve’s gaze for a moment. When he finally looked up, he saw so much hurt and awe in the other man’s eyes that he felt stripped raw down to his essence, his very bones. He couldn’t stand it. “Stevie, please… don’t look at me like that,” he said softly.

“Buck.” Steve’s voice quavered. “Of course you can stay. Stay as long as you want. I’ve been waiting for you for 70 years, you punk, and now that you’re back, I can hardly believe it.” Without thinking, he reached out his hand and touched Bucky’s own as he spoke. His voice was steady now, yet soft. “I don’t care if you don’t have your memories back, and I don’t care what Hydra made you do. It wasn’t your fault. And I know you’re different now; I won’t call you Bucky if you don’t want me to. I just want to help you. Whatever you want, whatever you need, I’m here and I’ll do anything for you, okay?” He managed a watery smile. “Always have, always will.”

Bucky sank into the gentle touch, feeling a sense of immense relief, and let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He was here at last with Steve, where he belonged. He was home.


End file.
